Prosecutors to again seek death penalty for Peterson
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California prosecutors said Friday they again will seek the death penalty for Scott Peterson even as a county judge considers throwing out his conviction for murdering his pregnant wife because of juror misconduct during a 2005 trial.
Stanislaus County Assistant District Attorney Dave Harris said prosecutors intend to retry the penalty phase of the case, spokesman John Goold said. He said prosecutors otherwise won’t discuss the decision.
Peterson, 47, wearing a buzz haircut and a mask designed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, appeared remotely in the Modesto courtroom from San Quentin State Prison north of San Francisco, home to the state’s death row.
District Attorney Birgit Fladager acted after the California Supreme Court in August overturned Peterson’s 2005 death sentence in a case.
The state’s high court upheld his conviction in that ruling. But the same justices in October ordered a new hearing in San Mateo Superior Court to determine whether his underlying murder conviction must also be tossed out if a juror committed “prejudicial misconduct.”
Peterson was convicted in San
Mateo Superior Court after his trial was moved from Stanislaus County due to the pre-trial publicity that followed the Christmas Eve 2002 disappearance of 27-year-old Laci Peterson, who was eight months pregnant with their unborn son, Connor.
The Supreme Court said his death sentence could not stand because potential jurors were improperly dismissed from the jury pool. In the second ruling, it ordered a San Mateo judge to decide whether the conviction must be overturned because one juror failed to disclose that she sought a restraining order in 2000 against her boyfriend’s ex-girlfriend.